


A Different Kind of Thief

by phinnia



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Good Omens TV
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-03
Updated: 2019-11-20
Packaged: 2021-01-21 06:43:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 10,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21295232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phinnia/pseuds/phinnia
Summary: The humans-in-NYC-AU- where Crowley is a thief (but not a very good one) and Aziraphale is a bookshop owner (not a very good one).
Relationships: Anathema Device/Newton Pulsifer, Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), Beelzebub/Gabriel (Good Omens), Beelzebub/Hastur
Comments: 12
Kudos: 55





	1. Chapter 1

Anthony Crowley was a bit too skinny and a bit too sharp for most people to really notice him. He blended into shadows like a penknife blends into its sheath with an easy click. He'd dropped out of school at sixteen the second he could get out of it with a palpable sense of relief from all around him, moved to the city, and spent most of his time in New York doing odd jobs for cash. New York was like that - if you were keen and cute and had a good set of cheekbones (he had all three in abundance) you could get along if you didn't feel the need for sleep or stable housing. He wore dark t-shirts, skinny jeans, had long red hair that trailed down his back in a tail, and spent most of his time wearing sunglasses and headphones, playing music in his ears. 

This caused most people to think he was just another particularly rude New Yorker on the subway. Anthony loved to cultivate that. He'd worked hard for that, after all. 

He'd been casing the bookshop for three weeks now. The store owner lived over the store like so many people in the Village did. 

What intrigued him about the bookshop was its bizarre opening hours. But mostly, he had to admit, the books themselves. 

He'd left school before he could get tossed out on his ear and home around the same time, but he always liked books. He liked learning, and knowledge. But books weren't really high on the agenda when you were couch-surfing or sleeping on the E train. Too much baggage to carry around. And there was something about the feel of _real_ books. The paper beneath your fingers. The binding. The ragged edges of each page. 

Of course, it was about the money. At least that was what he tried to tell Bee, his best friend. Bee worked at a coffee shop, which mostly involved trying to get everybody's name as wrong as possible on the cups, and lived with her boyfriend, who was going to Columbia for pre-law and wanted _everybody_ to know about it. He mostly met her at work, because her boyfriend made his spine itch and made Anthony want to put those teeth so far back he'd be chewing his dinner on the way out. 

So he flopped down on one of the corner sofas and waited. She'd be along at the end of the customer rush. 

She was, wearing her obnoxious springy green customer apron and carrying two coffees and a pastry. She set them down between them.

He picked up his coffee - which had a little doodle of an ant on it - and drank it, looking at her over his sunglasses. He didn't like talking, really. It was just ... a thing, he didn't like doing it much. Oh, he'd talk _back_, but starting conversations, that part was awkward as fuck.

"So Gabe's an ass." she drinks her own coffee, kicking her Docs against the table leg. 

This, at least, was familiar territory. He nods. "What'd he do now?"

Bee picked up her cup. It had a little doodle of a bee on it. "He paid for a suit instead of paying for _rent_."

"Holy _fuck_."

"Yeah. Tried to tell me it was important he have it for classes and pre-trial shit and all that. He's second year! And then I kicked him and kneed him in the fucking junk and screamed that I fucking hope our landlord has legal trouble otherwise we're going to be homeless living in a box beside the Henry Hudson Parkway. He might be able to make up with _his_ family, but I sure as hell can't make up with _mine._"

"Yeah." Anthony sighed. "Too true."

"Thoughts in that mysterious head of yours?"

"Nope, none. If you were my type ..."

"Sweetie, if we were each other's types I'd be tying you to this table right now."

"If we were each other's types we'd probably already have a five-year old, a three year old, and another one on the way. As well as me being tied to this table." 

She laughed, a long, rich laugh. "Eat that, okay? Just a plain croissant. Saved it for you." She gives him a kiss on the forehead, but it is just two friends looking out for each other. "Nothing weird in it."

He eats half of the croissant, drinks his black coffee, and disappears into the streets, just another New Yorker among millions.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Drainpipes are Not Fun. Neither is falling into a Dumpster. Do not try this at home.

At Z. Fell's books, downtown in the Village on 14th street near the A train stop, Newton Pulsifer surreptitiously looked out the window while pretending to rearrange a stack of paperbacks.

"She's not out there." his boss says with a chuckle.

He jumps and knocks over the whole stack. "I wasn't looking for anyone!"

"Newt." Mr. Fell knelt down and helped him pick up the books. "I may be a terrible bookseller, but you've been looking out that window at this same time for the past five days. She just works across the road in the crystals shop. I think her name is Annie or Anne or something like that. Just go over and talk to her. I'm certain she doesn't bite." He chuckles. "Well, she might. But probably not non-consentually."

Newt stared at his feet. "Uh - no. That would probably be a bad idea."

"Why?" 

"Because ... it would probably be a bad idea. She's always got her head in some book."

"And you work here. What a marvelous coincidence." He thumbs through the classics and selects one. "See if she's a fan of _Sense and Sensibility._"

He hands Newt his bag, his coat and the book, shoves him out the door, and flips the sign to 'closed'. When his eyes gaze across the street, he thinks he sees a shock of red hair among the figures in black and wonders if it's his ex-wife come to check on him. Probably looking for alimony. Again. 

No, it's not her. Good. He sighs and makes himself a cup of cocoa. 

Crowley was discovering several things about himself at three in the morning:

1\. Breaking into bookshops is difficult.  
2\. He was rotten at picking locks.  
3\. He was even worse at climbing up elderly drainpipes.

He'd tried to get in through the downstairs door, picking the lock with a metal nail file (the best thing he could afford from Duane Reade, and obviously the exact wrong thing for this job - all his research about lock-picking required specific tools, which he did not have the money for right now) so he decided to try a window, but none of them would open. So he decided to try getting in upstairs. 

When he'd lived in Pennsylvania (he'd lived in a very small town and the only other person worthwhile had been Bee; they'd met the first day of junior high, both misfits sitting in the back of the classroom wearing black, and they had gotten out of there as soon as humanly possible) there had at least been trees to climb up. 

Trees had branches.

Drainpipes, on the other hand, did not. 

He got most of the way to the window, though, which was really a testament to stubbornness.

Zira woke up to hear something ... clinking ... on the outside wall.

He'd been in the city a long time. Years. He'd developed the habit of sleeping through most things. Subways, Con Ed construction, neighbors fighting. But it really did sound like someone was trying to climb the wall outside. 

What?

He put his glasses on and got out of bed.

Then he saw a shock of red hair fall past the window, heard a shout of _"Fuck!"_, and the crash of someone falling directly into the dumpster below.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There really was, in fact, a guy last week who set his hat on fire. I swear it happened. You cannot make this kind of stuff up. CW: for brief mention of child abuse (past).

He hid under the garbage bags for while, cursing the whole city and why everybody in it had to eat _eggs_, and then he crawled out of the dumpster, checking carefully to make sure no bones wore broken.

No, didn't seem like there were. Just a lot of cuts and bruises. Sprained ankle, fucked up wrist. Nothing worse than a bad night with his dad, then. 

He breathed through his mouth, which made his life significantly easier, checked to see if his spare key to Bee's apartment was still there, and limped to the subway station. Fortunately he had enough Metrocard fare to get to Bee's place.

Bee's actual name was Beatrice. Fortunately, nobody sensible called her that. Gabriel tried a few times, and he usually got punched in the junk for his troubles, and then he decided to stop. They lived in Inwood, right at the end of the A line - a building with a dripping ceiling in the lobby, broken windows in the door, and way, _way_ too many six-legged roommates, but the rent was cheap, mainly because the landlord was busy all the time. It was one of those railroad apartments with a very, very long hallway you had to go down before you got to the living room.

Crowley let himself in quietly and turned to find Bee wearing one of Gabe's shirts. She looked awful, with circles under her eyes. 

"You look like crap." he says quietly.

"You look worse, bro." she chuckles. "What the fuck happened to you? You smell like a dumpster."

"I fell into a dumpster."

"Right." She shoves him into the bathroom. "Clothes off."

"Bee, I -"

"I said _clothes off, you stink._ Into the fucking tub." SHe throws a washcloth at him.

Right. He notices she still has the rubber duck he bought her ages ago. He puts the duck in and fills the tub. He can hear them arguing. Nothing new there.

"Who was that?"

"Just Anthony."

"You were in the _bathroom_ with Anthony? Bea - Bee, I've _told_ you - I don't like him coming around all the time - what if he _hits on you_?"__

_ _Crowley snorts. In what reality is he working in?_ _

_ _"Oh, for fuck's sake, Gabe." He can picture her making the 'I want to strangle you' hands. "He is _not my type!_"_ _

_ _"But -"_ _

_ _"He is gayer than a tree full of monkeys on nitrous oxide, Gabe!" She shouts. "He is more _your_ type! And he doesn't even like you!"_ _

_ _A pause._ _

_ _"Oh." He says quietly. "That kind of not your type." _ _

_ _"Yes!" she shouts, probably pulling at her hair._ _

_ _"You don't think he'd hit on _me_, do you - ooof! Ow!"_ _

_ _"Go play with your fucking _suit_!" Bee comes back in and slams the door. "Why am I dating such an ass?" She starts doing her makeup for work._ _

_ _"I've asked myself that for a while." Crowley sighs, getting into the water. "I think it's cheap animal lust at this point. You picked him up at a bar downtown, he was slumming it, one thing led to another a few times, here we are." _ _

_ _"Yeah, that's probably the reason." She shrugs. "If he wasn't such a dolt all the time, I might care. Ugh." She sits down on the edge of the tub._ _

_ _"You all right? You really do look awful."_ _

_ _"Yeah, fine. Pulling doubles since Moron out there had to go out as a fashonista for Halloween. Not to mention the _smell_ in here." She opens the window, letting cold air in. _ _

_ _"Bee, hand me a towel, will you?"_ _

_ _"Sure." She hands him a towel. "What the hell were you doing in a dumpster?"_ _

_ _"Trying to break into a bookstore."_ _

_ _"That one with the _cute_ bookstore guy with the white hair? The one that dresses like a time traveller? That one?"_ _

_ _Crowley sighs and tries to wrap the towel around himself and his face. It does not work. "Yes. That one. I have a big mouth."_ _

_ _"No, you just drink too much." She smirks. "You should just learn how to start conversations. Much easier than breaking into buildings."_ _

_ _"For some people, yeah." He sighs. "If your brain works normally."_ _

_ _"Hey." She takes him by the shoulders. "Stop talking shit about yourself. Your brain works _fine_. Okay, you're a weirdo. But you're my kind of weirdo, all right? I know you got kicked out of the library because you were talking too loudly to the plants. But this is New York! People are weirder than you on my _work commute_! There was a guy last week on the subway who set his _hat on fire_. And that was just _Tuesday_."_ _

_ _He laughs. "All right, all right, okay. I'll give it a shot. Can you fix up my ankle and my wrist?"_ _

_ _Bee slaps him on the back. "Sure can."_ _


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So the thief returns to the scene of the crime. There is a bad pickup line, which is actually not one, but it is.

"I swear." Zira says to Newt as they sip their drinks. "Someone was trying to climb the drainpipe at three in the morning."

"And then what happened?" Newt's eyes were very large. 

"Well ... well, the person fell." 

"Where?" Newt slops his milk-and-two-sugars-coffee all over his coat sleeve. "Were they hurt?"

"I looked. But I couldn't find them. I believe they fell into the dumpster. I heard them shouting." He picks up a double chocolate chip fudge cookie and nibbles it. "They shouted - well, they shouted 'fuck', which makes sense if you're falling from a second-storey window, and then there was a crash."

"Did you see anything out the window?"

"Just hair."

"Just _hair_."

"Yes. That's all I saw. Just hair. Very red hair." Aziraphale sips his tea. Darjeeling with a splash of milk. "Almost the exact shade of my ex-wife's. No, slightly different. A bit different. Redder. Yes. And much longer, she wore hers short. I thought I saw her yesterday. Thankfully it wasn't." 

"That's the one with the picture by the cash register I'm meant not to let in?" 

"That's her, yes." Zira makes a face. "Money-hungry bitch." He sets his cup down and turns to Newt. "So! Does she like _Sense and Sensibility_?" 

"Who, your ex-wife?" 

"No, no, Anna, or Annie, or whatever her name is!" 

"Oh, Mr. Fell, I don't think - wait, is that - uh ... is that -" Newt turns toward the door and whispers. "That's not _her,_ is it? Your ex-wife?" 

There is a figure in black - tall, slender, wearing dark jeans, black boots and a dark hooded sweater with the hood pulled back - standing in front of the shop. He's just lurking there, reading the posted notices about local neighborhood events Newt puts in the bottom part of the window and on the telephone pole outside, and Zira is almost about to ask him to move on, when he spots several things at the same time. 

He is wearing a bandage wrapped around one of his wrists. 

He also has very, very blindingly red hair that's pulled back in a tail. And that looks _very_ familiar. 

"No, it's not her." He drinks his cup of tea and smiles to himself. "But I do think I know who that is." He gets up and adjust his waistcoat, opening the door. "Excuse me? Did it hurt when you fell?" 

Crowley is just lurking outside the shop trying to think up something smart to say since he can't actually afford to _buy_ anything (anxiety sucks, and the worst part of being anxious is that it just _feeds_ on your brain like a _bloodsucking animal_, eating all of your emotions and stealing all of your breath until you can't think or do a damn thing, which is why he likes drinking, but when he drinks, he talks a lot, and right now, that would probably be bad, not that he could afford alcohol right now anyway, considering he's doing lucky to afford Metrocard swipes and the MTA has put transit cops everywhere so fare jumping is damn near impossible) - 

"Excuse me?" 

And then he looks up from his musings on broke-ness and anxiety and he sees Cute Bookstore Guy sticking his head out the door looking utterly adorable and luscious and _edible_ \- 

"Did it hurt when you fell?" 

Grk? What? Fuck. Was he asleep? 

He was totally asleep. 

_words, use your words_. He remembers his teachers always, always on him about that. _still hands. no stimming. hands in your lap. good boy._

He bit his lip, and the pain brings him back to the present, to the now. "Uh?" 

"Would you like to come in?" Edible bookstore guy is smiling. 

He nods. "Uh. Yeah." 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael is a fire-breathing dragon. Figuratively, not literally. 'Newton' becomes 'Napoleon'. Dinner plans are made, and bald-faced lies are told. Cw - fat-shaming.

Crowley can't decide what to do first or where to look. His eyes are prone to wandering - one of the biggest reasons he keeps the sunglasses on, not the only one by a long shot, mostly because direct eye contact is fucking awkward, even more awkward than talking - but the _feel_ of this place was so amazing. All the books. And it was so ... it was almost like a church in here. But better, because there weren't any weird stories, and nobody seemed to be telling you what to believe or telling you you had to do something or behave a certain way just because of some stupid book _they_ believed.

So many _books_. Better than the library. No plants to get angry about. 

Oh, crap. Cute bookstore guy was talking. Or maybe it was Other-Guy. He didn't catch his name. Newman? Norman? Something that starts with N. "Huh?"

"Oh. I asked if you'd like a drink. Coffee or tea or something."

"Uh." Shit. Questions. 

Does he want a drink?

"Um. Yes?"

"Something to eat?"

That's one's easier. "No." He shakes his head. Food's complicated.

"Tea? Coffee?" He's smiling again. He's got a nice smile. Sweet. Almost angelic.

Norman or Newman or Nathan or whatever his name is gets up off the sofa and spills coffee all over his pants. "She's out there!"

"Well, go, then!" Cute bookstore guy shoves Napoleon out the door. "Oh, dear." He shakes his head. "He'll be out there forever. I'm actually glad he spilled coffee on himself. Well, not really, at least he didn't spill coffee on her, I suppose." 

There's a deliberate, intense rat-a-tat-tat-ing at the door. "Aziraphale?"

"Oh, hell." Cute Bookstore Guy dives behind the sofa.

"I know you're in there." 

Crowley turns to look. "Who's that woman?"

"It's my ex-wife." He whispers from behind the sofa. "She's terrifying. She probably wants something. I expect it's money. What day is it?"

"Third of November."

"Oh, crap." He whispers. "I forgot to send the alimony check. Shit. If she finds me here she'll probably take it out of me."

"Out for her pound of flesh, is she?" Crowley murmurs.

"Oh yes, definitely." He chuckles. "Absolutely more Shylock than Portia, that one."

"Right." He gets up. 

"What are you going to do?"

"Don't say anything." Anthony waltzes over to the door and opens it. "What?"

"Oh!" She takes two large steps back, as though Crowley was going to set her on fire. "I'm Michelle Celeste. And you are?"

Dragon lady. She was absolutely a dragon lady. Red lipstick, black designer clothing. Labels he didn't recognize. Jimmy Choo pumps. He could live for a year just off those shoes. "Crowley." He says more flatly than usual.

"He is bedding them young these days." She mutters under her breath. "Have you seen my ex-husband?"

"What's he look like?

"Well, he's about so tall, and has absolutely no fashion sense, and fat, blonde hair that sticks up every which way, drinks tea, always has his nose stuck in a book -"

"Oh." Crowley smiles slowly, like when he was fooling that kid Hastur about there being a tax on swings in junior high. "Upstairs. Sleeping."

"Oh? Well, go wake him up, then!"

"Can't." Crowley looks down at his chipped black nails absently and silently counts to ten. "Kind of wore him out. We were up 'til dawn. You know. I just moved in." He grins wickedly. "Had to christen the whole place. Every room. Wore me out, too. Just down here takin' a whiz."

"Oh." She sighs and looks a bit irritated. "Well, tell him to call me, will you?"

"Yup." Crowley slams the door in her face. He can hear her walk away. He counts to twenty-five under his breath. "Why the _fuck_ did you marry her? She's not _human!_ She's a fucking fire-breather in pumps!"

"Got her pregnant by mistake." Aziraphale looks over the sofa, decides it's safe, and comes out. "Then she miscarried. She's horrifying, isn't she? The worst of it is her father's a city councilman, so there's no way I can get out of the alimony payments." He beams. "You were magnificent!"

"Aaah. Wasn't much of anything." Crowley murmurs, staring at his boots. "Had to get you away from her."

"Well, at least let me take you out for dinner, my dear boy." Aziraphale reaches out and takes his hand. "Tomorrow evening?"

"Uh ... sure." Crowley stammers. "That would be great."


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This one might be a bit long. Authorial opinions, what is weird about Crowley's brain, crepes, and more Shakespeare. Do yourself a favor and do not google Hubert's thing unless you are into that. That is totally okay, but I don't want any of your little critter friends in my house, all right? (How do I know it exists? I have a husband who googles things when he gets bored using the Private Window function.)

After they say their goodbyes (well, really, after Norbert or Nigel or Nico or Norton or Neil or whatever the _fuck_ his name is comes back and knocks Crowley right into Aziraphale, leaving him utterly breathless, and then Aziraphale takes his hand and kisses it and says 'I'll see you tomorrow evening then. Seven?' and all he can do is nod and hope he doesn't look really, really stupid) and he goes back to the A train and swallows the rock that has definitely materialized in his throat someplace between the bookstore and the uptown train platform. 

Thankfully Bee is working a double. She looks dead on her feet, though. Fortunately, the lunch rush is gone by the time he gets there and it's not commuter rush time yet so he can just park in his usual spot. Well, more like float into it.

"Hey!" she comes over and sits down across from him. "How goes it? You've got a grin on your face like I haven't seen since the last time the Mets actually won something big, which was like ... forever ago." 

"Oh my God, Bee." He starts biting one of his nails.

"Here." She gently pulls his hand away from his mouth and hands him a plastic straw. "Chew on this instead. Tell me what happened!"

"Well, he invited me into the store. I didn't even have to buy anything." He idly starts chewing on the straw. "And then his ridiculous ex-wife showed up. God, she was like Satan. Looking for her alimony check."

"Scary."

"Scarier than my _mom._" He bites down on the straw, bends it a bit, but keeps talking. "Mega-scary. So we got to be pretend boyfriends for five minutes. She still thinks we are. And - _and_ \- he's taking me out for dinner tomorrow night!"

"No shit?" Bee grabs him and gives him an enormous hug. "Well, fuck me!"

"No, we did that once, it was really bad, we decided not to do it any more. Don't you remember?" Crowley chuckles. 

"I know, _dumbass_." She grins. "It's an expression."

"I know that, I just like taking you literally to see what you'll do." 

"Well." She looks at his rumpled clothes. "Tonight you're staying at my place. No sleeping on the E train for you." 

"Are you sure this isn't going to send your tasteless boyfriend into a gay panic?"

"Not if he wants to get any ever again." She grins broadly at him. "Come on. I'm almost done. What chick movie do you wanna watch tonight?"

"Thought you were working until close?"

"Not feeling so hot." Bee shrugs. "Might be flu or something. Got Dagon to cover the last few hours for me."

That evening, Bee and Crowley were sitting on Bee's sofa in Inwood watching Golden Girls. Bee was doing laundry, and Crowley was helping her fold it. 

"Thanks." he says.

"For what?" she throws one of Gabriel's T-shirts into a pile on the floor. 

"You know. Doing this."

"Hey, thank _you_. It's way more fun watching this show with you here. Gabe hates my chick shows."

"Oh, my God." Crowley says, holding up a pair of boxers by one finger. "What in the _hell_ are these? Reindeer boxers? Is that actually - don't tell me the nose lights up."

Bee snickers. "Is lying bad?"

"The nose lights up. Girlfriend, you gotta do laundry more often. I do _not_ need a pair of these."

"Oh no." She's laughing harder now. "I like _you_."

Crowley throws them in Gabriel's-clean-laundry pile.

"Hey, buttwipe! Come out, get your fuckin' laundry before the roaches eat it!" Bee shouts.

Gabriel comes out of their room. "Why is it all on the floor?"

"Because I'm too tired to fold it after working two shifts trying to make rent so we can have a place to live for your lazy fucking ass because you _had_ to have a goddamn suit. Pick it up, fold it your own fuckin' self."

"What's _he_ doing here?"

"_He_ has a name, fucktit, and is sitting right in front of you. Wanna try again? I'll even give you another quarter." She flips him a silver coin. "Insult my best friend any more and you can sleep down in the basement where the trash piles up. Lotsa roaches down there."

"We knew a guy who had kind of a thing for bugs." Crowley says idly. "Remember Hubert, dude in high school?"

"Oh, man. Hubert. One weird fucker, that one. He was into bedbugs." Bee grins at Gabriel. "He used to use'em in _intimate_ places."

The face Gabriel pulls is utterly priceless. He's shuddering as he takes his clothes into their room. Bee and Crowley grin at each other in delight.

"Okay." Bee looks at Crowley the following afternoon. "Right. Got all your shit?"

"Yup. Keys. Wallet." He pats his pockets. "Gum."

"Here." She slips a handful of condoms in the back pocket of his jeans.

"You assume I'm luckier than I am."

"Well, you might be." She takes his hands. "Just be yourself. Don't bite your nails. I did 'em nice for you. I mean, he invited you to dinner, he can't think you're that weird. I'm only a text away, okay?"

Crowley swallows. "Yeah. Got it."

She stands on her toes and kisses him gently on the cheek. Crowley smiles at her and pretends to wipe it off. Then he slips into his black denim jacket and out into the evening. 

The A train was running with delays, as usual, because it was just past rush hour and all New York City trains are fundamentally more delayed when you're trying to get somewhere important. It's practically a law of the universe by now. And of course Crowley was trying to get from the far end of the line to right downtown, just after commuter rush hour, so naturally, the trains are running every twelve minutes and half of them are out of service. This may be true for trains everywhere, but it is definitely true for trains in New York CIty.

He promised Bee he wouldn't bite his nails, so he didn't, but he did bite his lip an awful lot. 

Damnit. Blood. He wiped it off on the back of his hand, then did the only thing he could think of and licked it away. It tasted of iron and copper and way too many shitty memories.

This was his stop.

He takes a deep breath and gets off the subway. 

Fortuately, the subway and the bookshop are not that far away from each other, and Crowley can run pretty fast when he wants to. Old survival instinct. 

Aziraphale was inside the bookshop, sitting in a puddle of lamplight in an armchair, reading. Crowley knocked on the door. He looked up and immediately beamed.

"Sorry I'm late, so sorry. Damn transit, I was staying with a friend and she lives all the way out in -"

"Breathe, my dear boy, it's fine." Aziraphale puts a hand on his shoulder. "Don't worry yourself. Is that blood on your lip? Did you get in a fight?"

"Uh - um. Yeah. It is blood." He smiles, a bit awkwardly. "No, that was just me. Bee - that's my friend - she told me not to bite my nails. So, well. I kind of ... I chew things." 

"Oh." He looks curious, and a bit concerned. "Is this a ... is this a self-harm thing?"

"No, no." Crowley shakes his head. "It's more like a ... I just need stuff to chew on thing. You know how some people chew on pens or pencils? Like that. I chew on, you know, well, right now it's mostly straws. Plastic ones."

"Oh! So it's like Freud's oral fixation. You need something to put in your mouth."

"Are you hitting on me?"

Aziraphale's blue eyes are sparkling. "Do you want me to be hitting on you?"

"Hey, I'm totally fine with being hit on, long as it's by you."

Aziraphale picked up a dove-grey woolen peacoat from the coat stand by the door. "Shall we go to dinner?"

They walk to the restaurant. It was a place that did crepes. He'd actually never had them before.

"What are these like?"

"Sort of ... very thin pancakes. Which you can put sweet or savory fillings in."

He could probably work with that, yeah. 

After looking through their menu for some time, he ordered the strawberries and cheese. It was simple, not too many conflicting flavors and nothing weird in it, and it ended up being pretty tasty, but he couldn't finish it. They talk about Shakespeare and about books.

"Do you want the rest of yours?" Aziraphale looks like he's enjoying every bite. Talk about oral fixations. Tongue swoops down around the fork, takes it in, and those noises he makes, the little wiggles in his chair. Crowley hopes he's going to be lucky tonight, because it's either lucky or really goddamn frustrated.

"No, no." Crowley shoved it across the table. "Food is ... " He sighs. "Complicated."

Aziraphale raises one eyebrow. "Can you explain?"

"Kinda. Well ... it's ... this is gonna sound weird. But you already heard about the chewing and you don't think that's weird, so -"

"Why would I find you weird?" He honestly looks baffled at that. "I think you're fascinating."

"A lot of people think I'm weird. It's not just the chewing. Food is ..." He tries to find the right word. "Too many complicated tastes at once, they overwhelm me. It's like my taste buds don't work properly? So I eat really simple things."

"Why the sunglasses?"

"That's complicated too."

Aziraphale leans across the table. "Do you mind telling me? This is quite interesting."

"People expect eye contact. All the time. They want you to look them in the eye, all the time. But that's so overwhelming. Listening is so much easier when people are talking. But they always want eye contact. So the sunglasses let me ... avoid it, and I can listen." He smiles at the table. "Plus, my eyes are a weird color and people are always asking about them."

"I never thought that way, about listening." Aziraphale murmurs. 

"I've thought about it a lot."

"Have you been diagnosed -"

"Yeah. High-functioning autistic. Asperger's, actually, before they took that out of the DSM-V, but I don't wanna use that term, because he was a Nazi eugenicist. I also hate the terms 'high functioning' and 'low functioning' because they're ableist and assume that speaking is the One True Way forward. Thanks for coming to my TED talk." He chuckles, staring at the table.

"I didn't know autistic people could form bonds."

"Yup." Crowley nods. "Just takes us ... a little more time, that's all."

Aziraphale looks at him curiously. "Do you drink? Wine, alcohol, anything like that?"

"I do." Crowley says, breathing out. "But that might not be a good idea."

"Why not?"

"Because I talk when I drink. A lot." Crowley toes his boot against the table leg. "You might ... well, I might tell you stuff."

"I will consider this an excellent opportunity to get to know you better." Aziraphale smiles, putting some bills on the table.

"All right, then, lay on, Macduff." Crowley puts his jacket back on and stands up.

Aziraphale stares at him. 

"What? Did I do something? Do I have food on my shirt?"

"You got the quote right." He breathes. "Nobody ever gets the quote right. People are always saying 'Lead on, Macduff'."

"I know, and that's so _annoying_, and then they get pissed at _you_ because they think you've got it wrong." Crowley grumbles. "I mean, I understand that english is evolving, but you have to respect the fucking Bard. I had an English teacher who got that quote wrong until I showed her that in the text of the play we were using, and she almost refused to listen to me at all. My friend had to bring her around a bit. Well, she punched a desk to get her attention." 

"This friend of yours sounds a little violent." Aziraphale chuckles. Crowley holds the door open for him, basking in the warmth of Aziraphale's smile.

"Only when she's pissed about something or someone she cares about. Or if you call her 'Beatrice'. I just call her 'Bee'."

"Is that where you were earlier?"

"Yeah. She lives all the way up in Inwood. Shit apartment, but her jackass boyfriend is Columbia pre-law, so I guess it's conveient for him. Not sure how much longer that's gonna last, though. He's only interested in himself. She's running herself off her feet to keep everything together and she looks like hell these days." 

Aziraphale looks over at Crowley's face, the slight wrinkles between the brows. "You're worried about her."

"Yeah, a lot."

He unlocks the door to the bookstore and holds it open. "Come in?"

"Sure."


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _I Send You This Cadmium Red_ is a fantastic book. And yes, they really do do all that stuff that Crowley says to autistic kids. CW for LGBTQ issues and fucked-up parents being generally fucked up. Drinking bleach is bad for you.

"What did you want to drink?" Aziraphale was fussing around the back room.

"Bee usually gets whatever she can afford, so I'm not picky. Whatever you're having is fine, really." Crowley is looking around at the bookshelves. "Wow, you have a copy of _I Send You This Cadmium Red_? That's a tough one to find."

"I'm surprised you've read it." Aziraphale was trying to find two clean glasses. One was in the sink. He knew there was another one. He eventually found it with a few dusty business cards inside it on the kitchen windowsill, and rinsed it out. "How's Scotch?"

"Sure. I ... got into an art phase for a while. I like the poetry in it, the words they like to use. 'Color is troubled light'. It makes you think about things differently. I like to do that." Crowley gulps his drink. 

"No, no, dear boy." Aziraphale puts his hand on the glass. "You need to sip it."

"Remember how I mentioned Bee usually bought what she could afford?" 

"Ah, I see. What does she do, exactly? You've never said."

"She works at that big corporate coffee monstrosity that's taking over the world, you know the one."

"Yes." Aziraphale laughs. "Whenever I go in there they always get my name wrong on the cup."

"Oh, that's intentional. She always draws a little ant on my cup and a bee on hers so we know which one is which." He takes a long drink, "My actual name is Anthony, but I don't like it, because it was my father's."

"Family trouble?" Aziraphale leans forward, nodding.

"Yeah. Lots. My dad ... he wasn't bad until he found out I liked guys. Then he started to beat the living shit out of me. My mom, she was different fucked up though. She wanted me better."

"Better how? As in ... straight?"

"No. As in, not autistic." Crowley swallowed, drinking more of his Scotch. "First, she tried faith healers. Then after that it was taking vitamins all the time. She got more and more desperate. All-natural medicine, vegan everything. She didn't let me get any of my shots. She even made me drink diluted bleach." He sighs. 

"You must be joking."

Crowley shakes his head and has another drink. "Thankfully Bee found out about the bleach thing and told me it was all wrong. I'd seen pamphlets on chelation on the kitchen table. It was only after I left that I found out what that meant. She was going to use it just ... because." He bites his lip. "It's toxic. It's awful for you. I mean, there are medical reasons they use it, to get rid of heavy metals in your system, but ... not for that." 

Aziraphale notices a trickle of blood running down his chin. He silently hands him a tissue.

"Thanks. Sorry, I said I'd talk, right?" Crowley wipes the blood off of his chin and finishes his drink. Aziraphale refills his glass, silently. "I do that a lot, talk a lot when I'm around someone I'm ... that I'm okay with." 

"I'm glad you're comfortable with me." Aziraphale says honestly. "So ... what did you do?"

"Well, uh, Bee had her own problems at home - don't wanna tell that story, that's hers, but her family are all assholes - and so we just ... you know, ran off to New York. It's not far from Pennsylvania. Only took a few days, walking. A week. We slept during the day and walked at night, through the woods and back country and by the side of the roads." He looks over his sunglasses, and Aziraphale can actually see his eyes. They are a startling light green, almost yellow. He can see them flickering back and forth around the room. He would normally think of that as restless, but the things Crowley has said to him over dinner has made him think again about that.

"Your eyes are really beautiful." He murmurs.

Crowley half-smiles. "I bet you say that to all the boys you like." 

"Right now, there is only one boy I like. And he's sitting right in front of me."

"Where is he?" Crowley looks under the sofa. "I'll deck him."

Aziraphale laughs and shifts over to sit next to him. "All right if I sit next to you?"

"Yeah." He smiles. "You're pretty when I'm drunk, and I'm pretty fuckin' drunk. I'm actually not that drunk, and that's not mine, I stole it." He takes a really deep breath and just says it. "But you are pretty."

"So are you." Aziraphale murmurs, trailing his hand along Crowley's cheek. "Do you mind taking your sunglasses off? I just want to see your eyes. I think they're beautiful."

"I won't - I can't -" Crowley murmurs. "I can't keep looking at you. It's too overwhelming. To do that."

"I know." he whispers. 

The air is thick, tense, like a slow, falling drop of water. Crowley takes his glasses off.

Aziraphale looks into his eyes for a second. They really are beautiful. He's not quite sure what shade of green that is. Pale, pale green. So light, bright. extra-virgin olive oil spilling out into a pan. 

"May I kiss you?" He whispers.

Crowley nods and leans forward. Their lips brush together.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things happen. Things get interrupted. Things begin to fall apart. Short chapter, but kind of pivotal.

Crowley hasn't done much kissing. Bee has kissed him on the forehead and on the cheek and that one terrible time they'd had sex when it didn't work at all. He usually finds it overwhelming, kissing. Most of the guys he's kissed just want to pull you into their mouths, suck you in, and it was almost like they were trying to eat you. 

Aziraphale lets him control the pace of the kissing. And it's so amazing, to be able to go slowly with it, to just be able to explore those lips one by one with his own, and then with the tip of his tongue. Softness. Everything about Aziraphale is so soft. But appearances are decieving. There are muscles under that softness, he can feel them there under the clothes, steel under silk. 

Aziraphale licks his lips, too. "Not spent much time kissing?" he asks breathlessly.

"Pretty overwhelming when it's done wrong." Crowley gasps. Ne kisses Aziraphale's neck, tiny little kisses, and he seems to like that a lot. "'Slike people are trying to eat you." It's okay to close your eyes when you're kissing, and that's nice.

Aziraphale thinks for a moment that he should ask how he's doing, but then Crowley starts kissing his neck, fluttery little kisses, and he decides that he's doing fine. He kisses Crowley back, being gentle, letting him take control of it, letting him set the pace, and eventually the kissing gets more heated and intense. 

"This all right?" Crowley murmurs, his hands sliding up under Aziraphale's shirt.

"Definitely."

"I like that you're so soft." Crowley whispers. "'Sbeautiful." 

"May I look at you?" Aziraphale asks, his voice thick. He runs his tongue over his upper lip and swallows.

Crowley nods. "Yeah."

"We can go as slow as you like with this."

"I know." Crowley kisses him again. "This is ... " He flaps his hands next to his head for a minute, quickly, and then pulls away from Aziraphale's mouth. "Sorry. I don't usually do that anymore."

"Don't be. Don't ever be sorry." Aziraphale whispers. "It's just another way of expressing yourself." He undoes a button and then another button on Crowley's shirt, exposing the deep auburn hair that trails down his chest toward the jeans. 

The bookshop phone rings.

"The answering machine will pick that up." Aziraphale murmurs into Crowley's neck.

"You have an answering machine?" Crowley laughs.

"Quite broke. I'm a lover, not a bookseller." Aziraphale mutters, burying his nose into Crowley's hair.

_You have reached A.Z. Fell's bookstore. Please leave a message after the tone, and we'll return your call during business hours. Thank you!_

A tearful woman's voice started talking on the machine. "Crowley, are you there? Pick up the goddamn phone, it took me forever to find this place." A long sniffle.

"Shit. Fuck." Crowley sits straight up. "That's Bee, and she's crying, and that hasn't happened in _ages_."


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> CW for a few references to past sexual abuse, abortion, incest, and rape. Also, Gabriel having a punchable face. But you already knew that one.

Aziraphale is closer to the phone, but because it's a wired handset, not a wireless one, it won't reach to where Crowley is sitting. He just grabs it. "Hello, miss? You've reached the right number - do you mind holding a moment? He's a little ... well, he's tangled up in his shirt."

"You must be his cute bookstore guy. Sorry to interrupt your makeout session with my personal crisis."

"I am." He chuckles. "You are Bee, I expect. It isn't a problem. He was awfully worried about you."

"Got it in one." She sniffles again. 

Crowley stops trying to get his shirt back done up and just pulls it right off. Aziraphale resists the urge to tackle him on the sofa. "Does this thing have a speaker phone button? Oh, there." He presses it. "What the fuck did he do to you?"

"Hope you didn't use any of those fucking condoms I gave you."

"What did he _do_ to you, Bee?" 

She starts crying again. "He poked pinholes in the condoms we were using and now I'm fuckin' pregnant again."

Crowley starts cursing. Aziraphale picks up the phone handset. "Bee? Can you come here? We'll wait up for you."

"Are you sure? I mean, I don't want to interrupt your date -"

"My dear girl, I am absolutely positive." He says, putting all the reassurance he can muster up in his voice. "Pack an overnight bag. We can find somewhere for you to sleep." 

"Thank you." Crowley says as they wait on the A train platform.

"For what?"

"For letting Bee sleep on your sofa. For being not a jerk about my brain being weird. Just for this. For all of this." He smiles, a quirky half-smile. "You're really amazing. You're like an angel."

"I like to think about it as me trying to live my best life." Aziraphale smiles back. "And helping other people live their best lives."

"How did you get your name?"

"My mother wanted one nobody had used." He sighs. "I guess I'm the Angel of the Eastern Gate of Eden, or something. Most people call me Zira." 

"I like it." Crowley puts his arms around himself to keep himself warm. "It suits you."

The next train comes in, and a girl gets off the train. She runs up to Crowley, and he wraps her in a hug.

Aziraphale had wondered what this friend of Crowley's would look like. He hadn't expected her to be so small, in all ways. She was short, barely up to Crowley's shoulder, and with dark brown hair barely peeking out from a knitted pink hat with cat ears on the top. The brown hair just brushed the edges of her chin, and she had very pierced ears. Her eyes were red from crying. She was wearing a blue sweater with holes in it, faded, over black leggings, heavy boots, and she was carrying a black backpack. 

"I can't be pregnant again." She sniffles, wiping her nose on her hand. "I can't go through another abortion. I'm not staying with him. I can't give up the baby to some stranger. And I can't afford to raise a baby on my own." 

"I know, I know." Crowley puts his arms around her, gently rocking her back and forth. "I know. I know."

He lets them have their moment, and then clears his throat. "Why don't I make us some cocoa?"

Bee tells him her story while Crowley is making the cocoa. It involves incestuous rape and pregnancy and makes him very, very angry, and now he's enraged at this mysterious boyfriend, who had _known_ about the abortion and the mental trauma she had suffered after she'd gone through it. He had done this deliberately, to force her into marriage. 

"I think I broke his arm." She laughs weakly, sipping her cocoa.

"He deserved it." Crowley says sharply.

"Amen." Aziraphale replies.

"You don't even know him." Bee says, looking at him with a very confused expression.

"He hurt a friend of mine." Aziraphale says. "I don't really like that. Or at least, a friend of a friend."

"Didn't you charge your phone at my place last night?" Bee asks Crowley, still looking confused.

"I kinda forgot, we were folding your laundry and watching the show."

"Oh, okay. Well, I filled up your voice mail." She wipes her nose on the box of tissues Aziraphale had set in her lap and blinks more tears away from her eyes. "Fuck. If I miss work again they'll fucking fire me, and I can't afford to be fucking fired right now. Not that I can work there anymore because the coffee smell makes me feel nauseous, so I dunno what the fuck to do."

Aziraphale thinks for a moment. "I think that Madame Tracy's - the crystal shop across the street - is looking for someone. Are you any good at filing? She's a little odd, she's a bit ... well, you may like her. She's kind of occult-ish."

"How can you possibly be so fucking nice?" Bee says, staring at him over her cup of cocoa. 

Crowley grins. "He's really an angel in disguise."

It was almost two by the time they'd gotten Bee settled on the downstairs sofa in a bundle of blankets.

"Where should I sleep?" Crowley asks quietly. "I mean, I can crash on the floor."

"You can sleep in bed with me." Aziraphale says. 

"Um - er - " Crowley stared at the toes of his boots. "I kind of talk a bigger game than I actually play."

"I just mean _sleep_." Aziraphale ruffled his hair. "I'm completely exhausted. But I'm not telling my ex-wife. As far as she's concerned, we bang each other silly every night."

"Completely fair." Crowley half-smiles at him, flinging himself backwards on the bed. He wriggles into it. "Oh, wow. I'd forgotten how comfortable beds were."

"What do you mean, you'd forgotten?"

"It's been a while."

"Sleeping on couches?"

"I used to sleep on Bee's couch, but her idiotic boyfriend has an extremely punchable face. So lately it's been the E train. Just nodding off between stations, you know." Crowley shrugs. "Mostly underground. I don't sleep a lot anyway." 

Aziraphale just stares at him for a moment before what he said fully sinks into his mind. "You ... don't have anywhere to live?"

"Not really."

"Now you do." 

"But -"

Aziraphale puts his finger across Crowley's lips, and then leans over and kisses them, long, very gentle, but lingering. "My dear boy. Shut up."


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Poor Newt. Things do improve for him, though.

Newt Pulsifer was late for work, because the A was running late again. He ran off the train just as the doors opened, tripped over his own untied shoelaces, fell down going up the stairs, picked himself up, and then kept running. He expected the bookshop to be unlocked, but it wasn't, so he ran straight into the door and bounced back off it.

Damnit. He rummaged for his keys, dropped them on the ground, bent over, fumbled them, picked them up, and unlocked the door.

No Mr. Fell. 

"Mr. Fell?" he shouted.

There's a mumbled shout from upstairs that could mean anything from 'good morning, Newt' to 'put the tea on' but which Newt usually interprets as meaning 'I'm still alive, I'll be down in a while.'

There was the sound of someone vomiting in the bathroom. There were blankets on the sofa, and an open backpack beside it.

A gangly redhead comes down from upstairs, blinking in the weak November sun, shoving sunglasses over his eyes. He was wearing dark boxers and a black t-shirt. "Oh! Napoleon, right?"

"It's Newt, actually."

"Newt! I ... I wasn't really paying attention to you. Your boss was cuter." He waves. "Crowley."

"You were here the other day! You're the burglar!"

"Yeah, kinda. Gave that up. Not any good at it."

More vomiting from the bathroom.

"Oh, _fuck_." Crowley runs over there. "Bee, you okay?"

"Who is that?" Newt, a firm believer in not interrupting vomiting people before they've been introduced, has not moved towards the bathroom.

"Friend of mine. Pregnant. Probably morning sickness. What helps with that?" Crowley asks.

"It's not _yours_, is it?"

Crowley turns around, cocks his hip to one side, looks at Newt over the sunglasses, and sighs. "No, it is _not_ mine."

Newt blushes down to his toes and decides to look through baby books to see what helps with morning sickness. 

Most of their baby books are names, but the few that do have helpful information say that ginger tea might help. They don't have any, though. All of theirs are caffeinated.

The crystal shop across the street is just opening up. He runs over there. The girl with the book, whose name is Anathema (he's figured that out by now) looks up when their little store bell goes off. "Oh, hi Newt."

"Do you have any ginger tea?"

"None for sale, but Madame Tracy has some in the back. Why? What's up?"

"Uh ... well, there's a pregnant person I don't know throwing up in our bathroom and the books say ginger tea might help but we don't have any and -"

She smiles softly. It makes her face look beautiful, Newt thinks. "We get a lot of pregnant people coming in here. I'll get you some things." 

He comes back to the bookstore five mintes later with a plastic bag containing soda crackers, half the box of ginger tea and - this is the best part - Anathema's phone number.

"I feel like shit." Bee says, sitting on the sofa in the reassmebled nest of blankets. "And this tea tastes like you pissed it out."

"Uh ... thanks?" Newt replies.

"She's always crabby like this." Crowley replies, patting Bee's arm. 

"Morning! Oh, tea's on! Wonderful. Crowley, dear, haven't you forgotten something?" Aziraphale comes down from upstairs. 

Crowley gets up, crosses the room, and gives him a soft kiss on the lips.

"Mmmm. Yes, that was lovely, darling." His eyes are twinkling. "I was more thinking your jeans, though, you left them upstairs."

"Oh." Crowley looks down at himself. "Right, clothes. _Pants_. Yeah."

"You have to tell him sometime that the baby's his." Crowley says, pacing around the shop, his hands in his hair, making it stand everywhere. 

"No, I _don't_, because I haven't even figured out what I'm doing with the baby yet, you fucking strip of bacon with _hair_." Bee glares at him. "I hate your fucking guts sometimes."

"No you don't."

"Shut up!" 

"Hello?" Madame Tracy lets herself in. "Is this a bad time?"

"So you are ... Beatrice, then." Madame Tracy sips her tea and leans forward, staring at her over her glittery cats-eye glasses.

"Um ... I just go by Bee. Bee is fine." Bee stares at her boots and wonders what the fuck she's supposed to say to this weird woman with the hippy skirt, hair in a greying ponytail and 'Free Hong Kong' T-shirt. 

"Oh, all right then. Bee. Zira says you're good at filing? Are you any good with computers? I'm terrible with them, and the whole store catalogue needs updating."

Bee nods. "Uh, yeah. I can do that stuff. I've taken some courses. Just free stuff, but I can learn, I'm pretty quick."

"Oh, good!" She smiles. "Anathema said you're expecting!"

"Um. Yeah. Kind of ... not really my idea. My ex-boyfriend was a bit of an assho - um, a dick." 

"Oh." She looks sympathetic. "Come along, Bee. I'll show you the store, you can meet Anathema. She can help you with our inventory system."

Bee just looks at Aziraphale, mouthing 'that's it?' He just smiles at her again.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I remember the first prenatal appointment. Long and boring and a lot of paperwork.

Crowley sighs. "Why do I have to go to this stupid doctor's appointment with you?"

"Because you are my support person and my best friend, you fucking moron, shut up and fill out this goddamn form for me."

A medical assistant comes out of the back. "Beatrice Tracy?"

"That's you." Crowley snagged the form and an extra pen, and followed her back into a room that smelled too much like cotton balls and medical disinfectant for his comfort. He sipped his coffee instead. The medical assistant took Bee's blood pressure and pulse and temperature and then told her that the doctor will be in to see her in a few minutes. 

"I hate being pregnant." Bee mutters, lying down on the table. "This is fucking shit. I want to take Gabriel and throw him through the nearest window. I fucking hate puking all the fucking time, and I fucking hate -"

The door opens. "Hello, I'm Doctor La Vista."

Crowley gets up. "What the fuck? It is not _you_."

Bee sits up on an elbow. "What - holy fucking shitballs."

Hastur looked at both of them for a moment, then sat on the stool and started to laugh hysterically. "Hold on, I _remember_ you two. The short one and the skinny one. Swing tax, right?"

"So ... you both just disappeared." Hastur says as he fills out Bee's medical forms. "That was ages ago."

"Yeah, well, her dad got her knocked up and my mom's a crazy nutcase who thinks that those of us with 'special needs' can be cured by vitamins, chelation or bleach drinking, plus my dad slapped me around for queerness with intent." Crowley shrugs.

"And now, a lot of things become nauseatingly clear." Hastur mutters, two-finger-typing with surprising skill. "Big theory going around at the prom was that you two ran off to Vegas and got hitched. I never really bought that, though. I mean, I always knew _you_ were as queer as a three dollar bill because you never hit on her, so I figured. But I was really curious about the shades."

Crowley takes them off. "Check it. Can't keep them off for long, though. I hate the lights in here."

"Yeah, they are kind of bad for people with your condition. Here." He dims the lights a little. "Wow, the color is interesting. She's got nicer eyes, though." 

"Already taken." Crowley says, grinning. "So taken."

"He's got a boyfriend already." Bee says. "Weird time traveller-guy."

"And you? I mean, you're pregnant."

"Wasn't really my idea." She sighs. "Fucking boyfriend."

Hastur puts his fist down on the desk. "Excuse me, _what_?"

"Well, that took longer than I expected." Bee says as they take the train back downtown.

"Only because he exploded and had to file a police report because Gabriel's a fucking assclown who sexually assaulted you." Crowley replies. "And he _was_ flirting with you, didn't you notice?"

"Yeah." Bee sighs. "I just ... I don't know."

"Oh, _come on!_ He's cute! He thinks you're cute! He knows about your past and doesn't give a shit! He's got that blonde hair going all spiky-uppy, he's almost a doctor, he's actually a feminist and not a fucking assclown! He's got deep dark eyes you could drown in for days! If I didn't have Zira I would be all over that like the fucking measles! Well, except for that annoying thing about him being more partial to ladies." Crowley huffs. "That's always been ... a bit of an issue." 

"How's things going with you two, anyway?"

"Oh no. We are _not_ discussing my love life. Today, _your_ love life."

"Look, I'm shit at picking men!" Bee shouts. "Me and men are a bad idea!"

"I know! Fortunately this one picked you, so you don't have to worry about it!"

"Where do you sign up for being a lesbian?"

"You can't just sign up for being a lesbian and you _know that_!" Crowley shouts back at her. "They don't have a goddamn lesbian _charter_!"

"I know." Bee whispers. "I just ... I don't want to get stuck with another jerk."

Crowley pats her shoulder. "So ... don't. Just keep living in the weird lady's spare bedroom. keep working at the fucked-up crystal store, and go out for coffee with him. Didn't he give you his business card?"

"Yeah." Bee says, sighing. "He did." She pulls it out of her pocket. 

"Ooh, he wrote something on the back." Crowley says.

She flips it over. 

It says 'call me? please?' in a very hard-to-read doctor's scribble, and there was a phone number.

"Oooh." Crowley grins at her and wiggles his hips. "I bet he's great in bed. Probably a lot better than your last one."

"Shut _up!_" Bee hisses, and stomps off the train.


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Hastur/Bee-centric chaptur. This particular Hastur eats avocado toast. There is much crunching.

"So how was the baby visit?" Aziraphale asks as soon as they come in.

"Oh, Bee met a cute doctor that we used to know in high school." Crowley takes up his usual position with his head resting in Aziraphale's lap, crumpled up like a half-folded paper airplane. Aziraphale runs his hands through Crowley's hair, and he almost purrs like a cat, his hands flexing gently in the air. "He was flirting with her all through the appointment. He even gave her his number."

"Oooh, that's nice." Madame Tracy sips her tea. "Are you going to call him, dear?"

Bee opened her mouth, and then her phone starts ringing on its own. She looks at it and drops it on the floor. "Shit!"

"What?" Crowley sits up. "Gabriel?"

"No! It's ..." She holds out the phone. "It's - it's him."

"Oooh, answer! Answer!"

"It might be about the baby, dear." Madame Tracy takes her hand.

Right. The baby. Bee picks up the phone and takes the call. "Hello?"

"Oh, hey!" He's eating, Bee realizes. He's eating as he talks. Sounds like ... toast. "I needed an excuse to call you, so I thought I'd tell you that your test results all came back normal. That's good and bad."

"How is it bad?"

"Well, it's bad because I won't get to see you again before your next appointment." Crunch. "Other than that, all good. Well, your blood sugar was a little low. We'll watch that."

"What are you _eating_?" Bee asks bluntly.

"Avocado toast." he replies. "It's quick, full of nutrition, I can eat it between patients when I'm on-call mostly falling asleep, and well, I'm kind of obsessed with it at this point. I mean, I'm a fourth year resident. Better this than ramen. Thankfully it's not rent week." Crunch crunch. "Then, it's ramen."

"That's ... very millenial."

"Yeah, but cheap, because it's popular. I can mostly afford it on a resident's salary." Crunch crunch. "Oh, yeah. There was something else. I heard back from my cop buddy. Your ex-boyfriend got arrested half an hour ago."

"What, already?" She blinks. 

"Yup. He doesn't fuck around with rapists." Crunch. "The assistant D.A will want to see you about pressing charges - I figure you want to press charges?"

"Oh, fuck yeah." 

"Good." She can hear him smiling through the phone. "I can meet you downtown at the courthouse. For, you know." He coughs and sounds a little shy. "Moral support while you're filing the restraining order. Or you can go by yourself, obviously."

Bee closed her eyes and remembered the scrawly writing on the back of the business card. How he'd said _please_. How he'd offered to meet her instead of pushing his way in. How he was _angry_ about what had happened to her.

"Sure." She said. "That would be great. Uh, when? What time?"

"I could do tomorrow? Afternoon, three if you could make it?"

"I can probably do that."

"Do you know where the courthouse is?"

"Yeah, I can find it. I've got Google."

"Great. I'll see you then. And I'll bring a printout of your test results, okay?"

"Sure." She coughs and looks at her feet. "Thanks."

"No problem." She can hear his smile again. 

"Enjoy the rest of your toast."

"I will."

She hangs up.

Crowley is staring at her (well, as much as he ever does). Madame Tracy is holding her hand and looking very curious. Aziraphale is pretending like he's reading.

"He likes avocado toast." She says. "He was eating ... avocado toast during the phone call."

"Well, he's almost a doctor, he interrupted his dinner to call you, Bee." Crowley says. 

"That's very nutritious." Madame Tracy nods. "I wonder if he's vegetarian." 

"Didn't say. And he's going to meet me downtown tomorrow afternoon so he can be moral support when I file the restraining order against Gabriel." Something occurs to her. "Hey, do you still have those condoms? The ones I gave you?" 

"Yeah, upstairs." He runs up to his room and returns with four condoms. 

She inspects them carefully. Yup, they all have holes in them. 

"I'm going to take these. Might be able to use them for evidence or something, right? Oh, he has a cop friend, and Gabriel's already been arrested." 

"Oh, _marvelous_." Aziraphale says, beaming. 

Crowley gives her an enormous hug. "Kick his butt." 

"I agree with young Crowley." Madame Tracy says. "Kick his butt. What did your young doctor say about the baby?" 

"Oh! All the tests are normal! And he's bringing a print out of them. My blood glucose is a little low, but he says they can just watch it for now." She feels a flutter in her stomach at the whole notion of him being 'her young doctor'. Ridiculous. 

"Well, we should be getting back." Madame Tracy finished her dandelion tea. "I'll be in tomorrow, Mr. Fell, if that's all right?" 

"Of course! It's fine." 

Bee gave Crowley a hug. "Thanks." she murmurs in his ear. 

"No problem." he smiles crookedly at her. 

**Author's Note:**

> Any resemblance to real-world locations is probably not deliberate, of course, except when I meant it, which is most of the time.


End file.
